Conatus Pharmaceuticals, a venture capital-backed liver disease healthcare company, has bought its chief executive’s former business from Pfizer for reportedly less than a tenth of its sale price in 2005.
Pfizer had paid an estimated $400m to $500m for Idun Pharmaceuticals in 2005, according to news provider VentureWire in an article at the time, although this was most recently estimated at $298m, before the sale of the subsidiary to Conatus this month.
News provider PEHub said after an interview with Steven Mento, the former chief executive of Idun and current head of Conatus, that, as the new firm had not needed to raise new venture funding, the price tag for the recent sale of Idun was "well under $30m".
Drugs peers Novartis and Abbott Laboratories had been part of the consortium originally backing Idun during its $109m venture fundraising.